The Tears I Cry
by rubyremembrance
Summary: My tears stung my cheeks, the salt prominent. I knew somebody could see me, and I knew that I wouldn't be able to hide the water running down my face. But I didn't care. He left me for her. My daughter. "Percy..." I whispered. Olympian Challenge Response!


Hey, it's Ruby Rememberance. Well, that was a dumb way to start this, of course you know who I am... Let's try that again. This is a one-shot I wrote for **Felicity Dream**'s Olympian Challenge.

This is not Percabeth, it has some mention of it, but it's not heavy on it. Of course, it's close, it's Percathena. *insert gasp here* I know, weird right? All my friends think I'm crazy for writing it, but it seems sweet to me. Not as long as Felicity Dream's Grim Olympian Tales--which are amazing, by the way--but that's understandable, since it's my first story, let alone one-shot. Well, technically it's my... twelfth story, but the other ones are weird and not suitable for posting.

I am Canadian, so I may spell things like "favourite" and "colour" differently than some people, just a heads up. And I was really eager to post, so if there's something wrong with it, tell me in a PM and I'll fix it ASAP.

**DISCLAIMER: I am an unmarried, fourteen year-old girl. I obviously do not own Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Rick does not own the gods, Calypso etc. Nor do i, I would be the Ancient Greeks... Luckyyyy...**

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_**The Tears I Cry**_

The cool salty water was running down my face at a slow pace while the sea spray licked my cheeks. I was not hysterical, but I surely could be soon. The hole in my heart where he was supposed to be pounded with a dull pain, reminding me that what I wanted could never be, for his heart was taken by another. _And_, I thought bitterly, _you love her too. You could never hurt her the way you want to._

My sobs came with gasping breaths, my lungs inhaling the sweet sea air. _What are you doing? You are strong, you are better than this. Crying over a boy_. I found resolve in this, but soon my mind was flooded with thoughts of him. His sea green eyes that I lost myself in every time I looked in them, his deep soothing voice that calmed my nerves yet drove me crazy.

Please. Please say yes. _I thought. The gods had just offered to make him a god alongside his father and he was thinking it over. His innocent—shocked—look contradicted his tough exterior that so often exhibited that he couldn't be surprised._

_I saw that he was looking at each of the gods in turn and put on my most impasse expression just in time for him to look at me. His gaze faltered for a second and he opened his mouth as if to say something, but thought better of it and he turned his head. _

_I noticed that his eyes had lingered on me longer than the other gods and I felt a smile tug at the corner of my mouth. Just as quickly as the smile had appeared, it faltered. I felt somebody looking at me and turned my head to see Poseidon fixing me with a curious expression. I shrugged and looked away._

_He looked at my daughter and I saw that she had like she was about to have a panic attack. I saw the look in his eyes and felt my heart break a little. Right then, I knew he made up his mind, and I knew that I wasn't going to like it. I stared at my daughter to keep myself from hearing his next words, to protect myself. _

_I heard my father swear on the River Styx that we would act upon his words as long as it was within our power. I heard his terms but didn't pay attention until he said that we must release all the peaceful Titan-kind. I inwardly promised myself that I would volunteer to do it myself. _

_Maybe Calypso would help me get over this feeling called heartbreak._

Soon it became too much to bear and my knees gave out. I lay on the sand, so much like the colour of his own skin, and didn't—no, couldn't—move. My blond hair tumbled into the waves lapping my face. They disguised my tears, but couldn't hide my ragged breathing.

"Athena," I heard his voice call me. I felt his footsteps pounding on the ground as I struggled to sit up. Hearing him relieved the pain in my chest, made me feel whole again. "Athena, are you okay?" His voice sounded panicked—I felt his panic, but despite it, I chuckled at his stupid question.

"Of course I am okay. I am the goddess of wisdom, I know how to keep myself from being hurt." _Except for maybe one kind._ I got up to leave and I felt his panic again. But this time it wasn't like he was worried about my safety, which is a kelp-head thing to worry about in the first place, but more that he didn't get to say what he wanted to say before I left.

"Athena wait," He spoke up. My heart raced as I stopped and spun slowly. "I need to tell you something."

"Well, you just did tell me something, but I will allow you to finish your thoughts. Proceed." I raised my eyebrows in apparent impatience and waited. It was only after he hung his head that I realized that he was intimidated by my older appearance. I walked forward, towards him, shrinking my size with every step I took. "Yes?" I added.

"Well, I um… I wanted to tell you that I…" He shifted from foot to foot as he avoided my eyes. "Never mind." He added hastily before hastily slinking away. I stood there bewildered before shaking my head and going to Calypso.

I appeared on Ogygia, a beautiful island covered in lush green rainforests and bustling with wildlife. An invisible servant shuffled up to me holding a pina colada on a glistening sliver tray. I threw gold glittering dust up and it landed on the servant and outlined the hand, which was waving me towards the center of the island, where Calypso lived.

The hand led me to a summer beach house, pure white and blue, and it made me homesick, for it reminded me of Greece. The hand signaled for me to stop and stay, then it floated inside, leaving me to sip on my pina colada alone. I admired the crafting of the house and was focusing on the elegancy of the doorframe when a girl with caramel coloured skin and sun streaked hair floated out of it. She wore an expression of confusion, and when she saw me, her expression morphed to one of pleased surprise.

"Athena, I never thought I would see you again! How have you been?" Calypso was apparently very cheery today, for she had a glow to her face, but that could just be from the moonlace that she plants at night.

"Uh, I'm alright, I guess." I was bewildered at how bubbly she was, especially after I was one of the quickest gods to vote her on the island. "I just thought that I would like to let you know that after we gods won the second Titanomachy, one of the conditions was that we let the peaceful Titan-kind, such as yourself, out of their various prisons."

"Really?" Calypso's eyes lit up at the thought of being able to see the world, especially the "Manhattan" that Percy had told her about when he had washed up on her island. I nodded. "Who was the person who released us?"

"Perseus. He thought it was unfair for us to imprison you for something you might do, not for something you did do." The ache in my heart came back at the mention of his name.

"Oh, Percy, how is he?" She asked, genuinely interested.

"That is something you will have to ask him. I have no idea. I do not understand men. Some days I wonder if I should've sworn to become an eternal maiden like Artemis." That last part was mostly to myself, but Calypso heard it. She waved the servants away and led me to a beautiful place, a private place with a gated entrance leading to a garden filled with beautiful, exotic plants, especially pansies.

"This is my private garden, where I come to spend some of the days after a hero leaves. I think about nothing, nothing but planting flowers and tending to the ones already here. It may seem strange to have the love-in-idleness flower here, but Hermes had brought it to me during the Elizabethan period after Shakespeare wrote mention of it in _A Midsummer Night's Dream_. I found it beautiful, and so planted it in my private garden. I choose to still live here, even after my release, as I could not bear parting from my home, but you may visit this garden as often as you like. But one thing that I always wished I could have was a companion to talk with about my most recent heartbreak. Now, what happened?" It may not have been wise to tell somebody who used to love Percy what I felt, but Aphrodite makes fools out of all of us at some point.

"I don't know how it happened, but there is something about him. I don't want to hurt my daughter, but I want him to be mine, I want to be his. But he loves my daughter and he would never hurt her. I had already made it clear that I do not like him because he is a son of my rival, but after, I saw how noble and wise—contrary to popular belief—he was and I fell in love. I don't know what to do and I don't want to sound like a hypocrite, but it seems I have no choice. This is Aphrodite's way of revenge for saying the mind rules over the heart, I have no doubt about it." Calypso thought for a bit and we sat in silence.

"Well, this is quite a predicament. I don't know how those mortals do it these days—or any days, seeing as there were very few mortals when I was free—but I always found it helpful to just tell him. That could also be because I always promised myself that I wouldn't get attached, they noticed I was behaving strangely and persuaded me to tell them why. But it couldn't hurt. The only way to get over somebody is to tell them how you feel." She sighed.

"I suppose. But what if it takes too long for me to do it and something happens to him?" My voice was small as I thought of the many horrors that could befall him.

"Then do what Dionysus did with Ariadne; make him immortal." Calypso had a mischievous glint in her eyes and a smile on her face.

"But what if he doesn't love me? Nothing could be worse than having to live with your love for eternity if he doesn't love you back." I shook my head.

"If you feel true love—ask Aphrodite—then he should love you back." She reasoned.

"No, I cannot. She has worked too hard to make my daughter and him work out their true feelings, I cannot just break it up. Plus, she'll never let me live it down if I go to her for advice, especially since we've been arguing for the past couple thousand years about what rules the body—mind or heart."

"Then the only thing you can do is take a chance. In this life, there will always be difficult choices. But the question is, is it worse to say something and wish you hadn't or to not say something and wish you had?"

"That is very wise, even if it dabbles in the matters of the heart. I will take a chance, even if it takes me forever to get the nerve." I became more confident when Calypso asked me the question, as if wisdom could have something to do with love. "Well, my job is done, I should go release the other peaceful Titan-kind from their prisons. Farewell, Calypso, and thank you."

For the goddess of wisdom, it was strange that I couldn't remember where the other peaceful Titan-kind were imprisoned. It took years to track down all the Titans, let alone to determine whether they were peaceful or not. I never forgot him, but I never had time to find him. I always thought of him when I was releasing a Titan, since it was his doing that I was there. When I finally had time to myself to find him, he was dying. My daughter had died a few years previously, due to an attack from a stubborn hellhound that didn't realize she wasn't who it was looking for.

I teleported to his dying place, to his side as his breaths grew hoarse and difficult.

"Lady Athena," he coughed. "What do I owe this pleasure to?" He smiled, his lips cracked and dry.

"Nothing, Perseus. I wanted to visit my favourite hero. Other than my own children, of course." I returned the smile, my voice soft.

"Then why are you visiting me, not that I object." He wondered.

"I came because I had something to tell you that is long overdue." My voice trembled. "Well, you and Annabeth always thought that it was because you are a son of my rival that I objected to your relationship." He nodded and closed his eyes.

You know how in movies, as the love of the main characters life is dying, the main character always seems to have just enough time to tell them how they really feel? Too bad life doesn't work out that way. Perseus closed his eyes and took his last breath, as I was just about to tell him. I was heartbroken. I even forgot momentarily that I was a goddess who could bring him to immortality on Olympus. I cried for ages, or it felt like a while, my tears stinging my face. I hadn't cried since that day on Ogygia, when I remembered Calypso's words.

_Make him immortal._

My tears trickled to a stop as I thought it over, and I remembered her words once more.

_Is it worse to say something and wish you hadn't or to not say something and wish you had?_

In that moment, I made my choice. I disappeared from the room and reappeared on Olympus, where I made off to find my father. I found him if the throne room, just where I thought he would be.

"Father, if I may, I would like to ask a favour." He nodded. "If I may, I would like to make Perseus a god." He stared at me in stunned silence.

"What are your reasons?" I smiled. If he didn't say no outright, it meant he was either in a good mood, or he thought it was a good idea, and coming from me, it's a good idea.

"He only declined because he wanted to live his life as a regular mortal, but now he has lived his life to the fullest, and should be rewarded for his deeds during his life." I stated. "Plus, he could be an asset, and stop Dionysus' whining about being stuck at the camp, for Percy has always liked it there." He thought about it, and nodded.

"Very well, but only because it will stop Dionysus' complaining." He shooed me away and I walked out of the room with a bounce in my step.

I summoned him back, but he didn't understand what was happening when I explained it to him. He just did what I told him to do. When it was over, he stood up, disoriented and looked around with his new vision, a look of extreme confusion plastered on his face. I let him look in wonder for a little, amused with him.

"Hail Perseus, god of memory and foresight. You have taken over Prometheus and Mnemosyne's domains, relieving them of their duties." He spun to find me, with a slight smile on my lips.

"Were you the one who brought me back?" I nodded. "Then I should tell you something. I, this is hard." I nodded again, encouraging him. He shook his head in defeat.

"Then I'll go first, since I have tried to tell you for your whole life. Perseus, I love you. After meeting you, I knew I couldn't live without you." I calmly said, as his jaw dropped for a moment, then chuckled.

"That makes my job so much easier then, since I love you too." My heart lifted and I'm sure my eyes brightened.

"Thank you," I saw the confused look in his eyes. "Thank you for letting me tell you that and not letting me wonder what it would've been like if I had told you."

He laughed. "I believe that it should be me saying that, since you were the one that made me a god." He trailed off as a little boy ran into the room, yelling "mommy". "Who's that?" He whispered to me. I picked up the boy.

"This is Diodoros, or Don. He's our son." His blond hair and green eyes sparkled in the sun as Percy looked on him in loving wonder. "He's the minor god of wonder." He smiled a toothy grin at his father and Percy laughed. It was then that I knew he would make a great god.

And an even better father.

And I'm never wrong.

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**So there it is... Hope you enjoyed!! Anything you thought about it, good or bad, tell me in a review!! I am honestly, one of those people who doesn't think I'm all that great, so I won't take it personally. I'm way too tired to try to warn against flaming, because only the best stories don't get flamed, so go ahead, flame if you really think it's necessary.**

**Thanks for reading!**

**~Ruby**


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